What is Engine Performance Restoration Service?

My wife just took her Mercedes 350 in for a 50,000 service and the shop sold her this “upgrade” service which included this Engine Performance Restoration service. Is this total baloney or what for $100.00!

Most likely, it involves the addition of additives to the fuel system and the crankcase, such as those marketed by the BG company. However, that is just my best guess.

Surely the most accurate answer would come from the dealer’s service department, so I think that you should ask them for an explanation. It is very possible that they even have a booklet detailing that “service”.

Why ask the place that did the service when there is the interweb ? :thinking:

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Dealership profit restoration service.

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Indeed. If you suspect someone of lying to you/cheating you, don’t dream of asking an informed, neutral party. Instead, ask the suspected liar/cheat and give him a chance to lie again.

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The “Engine Performance Restoration Service” is a reoccurring special program that is offered by many dealership owners across the country. The dealership owners usually run this program parallel to and concurrent with their Yacht payment schedule. Over the years this program has been shown to restore performance for all parties involved. The customer enjoys the return of the lost engine performance that they never knew went missing and the dealership owners enjoy what could be called a healthy gain in fiscal performance. So, clearly, everyone leaves happy…No?

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These restoration services are dealer profit.Follow the manufacturer maintenance service written in your owner manual and you will be fine.

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Yes, and no…
Many–or perhaps most–manufacturers have deleted transmission fluid changes from their maintenance schedule in an attempt to show low maintenance costs. However, anyone who follows that misguided attempt on the part of the mfr is likely to wind-up with premature trans failure. Similarly, valve lash adjustments seem to have disappeared from mfr’s maintenance schedules, but that doesn’t mean that this type of maintenance is not necessary at some point.
:thinking:

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Because if the place that did the service lied about its necessity, what makes us think they’re suddenly going to tell the truth when asked about it?

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Back about 10 years ago, the dealership that I patronize was doing a soft-sell push for BG “service”, and they had brochures explaining the rationale for those add-ons. I declined, and a couple of years later, they weren’t even pushing those BG products anymore.

Even if the dealership provides hokey “evidence”, I still think that they should be asked to provide an explanation, be it verbal or printed.

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If the person had called the service department first and asked for a detailed explanation of what the upgrade service actually was then they could post it here . That would let people call it questionable and he could also look at the product web site . Maybe even after he called they might even give a discount on the next oil change just to avoid irritating a customer .

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It’s likely absolute baloney, but I’m shocked a Mercedes Benz dealership didn’t mark the price up closer to the $200 range :wink:

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That is some cheap baloney! Most all dealers get more.

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total baloney, the car is still like-new

Agree

[quote=“texases, post:14, topic:159170, full:true”]
That is some cheap baloney! Most all dealers get more
Thin sliced as oposed to thick sliced

I’ll take Lebanon Baloney please.

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Might be legit. If your car is newer than 2006, then it likely has direct injection. Because vehicles with direct injection do not have any gas in the intake, carbon from the EGR and PVC systems can build up on the tops of the valves and the lower valve stems, slowly reducing the cross section for air to enter the engine, slowly choking the engine to death. Eventually it will lead to a burnt valve.

There are new treatments for this but it is not as simple as adding an additive to the gas, either in the tank or at the fuel rail. It has to be sprayed through an adapter directly into the intake at the throttle body and it is not a quick procedure. It will take all of an hour of the mechanics time so doing this for $100 at a dealership does seem very unlikely, considering that the chemicals alone cost about $40.

Talk with the dealership service rep and ask for a description. If he says that they hook up an adapter to the fuel injection system to clean out the injectors, that is a legitimate service but will do you little good. It is mainly for pre 2006 engines with port injection and is likely outdated for your vehicle. They need to catch up with the times.

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Apparently nobody cleans intake valves anymore, just wait until the vehicle is crippled and your customer tows the vehicle in.

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$100 isn’t really much money in the automotive service world.

I’m going against the majority of opinions here and suggest that the people who regularly service the make and model of your vehicle probably have a pretty good idea of what kind of maintenance is appropriate for your car. Frankly the only baloney I see here is the idea that a modern day car never needs any type of maintenance to keep it running properly. The idea that a service isn’t needed because it isn’t listed in the owner’s manual is misguided.

Recently a woman was bringing in her car with a complaint of a check engine light on, the car would hesitate on acceleration, then start pinging with smoke out the tailpipe, the check engine light would start flashing, then the car would act normal for a bit. The car had 92,000 miles. A 5 minute test-drive with a scan tool before even opening the hood indicated the car had excess carbon fouling in the intake system. We asked the customer if she had ever had a fuel injection and induction system service done. She said no, her dad told her it wasn’t needed. I told her the car should have had 3 of them by now and at this point there was no guarantee that doing it would get the car running right. What exactly did this driver save by not doing the dealer recommended maintenance?

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